This is a public-interest archive. Personal data is pseudonymized and retained under GDPR Article 89.

Nelumbo


	Keith Romanczyk <fdic@moran.com> asked the following:

>Can someone please tell me the best way to deal with Nelumbo after they
>germinate?  Germination is the easy part;  I need to know what medium to
>plant in, how deep, how soon after germination, etc.,etc..  

	Yup. Plant in a heavy clay-based mix; recall that nelumbo grow in
shallow ponds, which are typically (ta-dah!) clay-bottomed. VERY heavy
mix will not bother them at all...

>I have an aquarium set up in my greenhouse.  Should it be filtered?
>Cleaned? Ignored totally?


	...but growing them in small containers _will_. Now, if you're just
_starting_ them, everything's fine and dandy to do it in small containers
(less than 100 gallons). Once they get cooking (and they DO grow fast), they
will readily grow 40-50 feet in a season, and often more. They will plow
through dirt berms between ponds, making pests of themselves. Fortunately,
they are brittle, and readily exterminated from ponds where they have
spread in an unwanted manner.
	The seeds themselves are extremely durable; in fact, some recovered
from the famous 'dried-up Manchurian lakebed' have germinated after many
(>1,000) years in storage. Some that have sprouted from this long-extinct
plant are in cultivation (IIRC) at the National Zoo, but I _could_ be
wrong about. One of my buddies in horticulture has some seeds from this
plant (flown out of China during the Nixon administration as a personal
favor) growing in a cattle tub in central PA. They are striking plants,
but not for the faint-of-heart.
	Fertilize heavily. The rootstock is brittle: do not play with it
unnecessarily. Plant in water below the freeze line (more than 3 feet depth
in most areas). Do not plant in plastic tubs for the winter; heavy wood
(with 'triangles' fitted to the insides of the corners to prevent the
tuber from impaling itself fatally during growth) is suitable, as are
galvanized watering tubs.

	-AJHicks
	Director, Orchid Seedbank Project (ahicks@nmt.edu for list)
	Socorro, NM
Other Mailing lists | Author Index | Date Index | Subject Index | Thread Index